Pacifica, CA
How exposed is Pacifica to wildfire?
Pacifica's 12,694 buildings earn a 80th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — well above the national norm for wildfire risk. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Pacifica at the 78th percentile, close to its 80th-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS puts 53.4% of Pacifica's 12,694 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 15.3% Direct and 31.3% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to. At 12,694 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Pacifica ranks
Pacifica ranks lower within California (40th percentile statewide) than its 80th national percentile suggests alone — a calmer spot in a state where wildfire risk generally runs high. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Pacifica ranks 6,454 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,206 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 948 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
Pacifica and the insurance market
Pacifica sits in California, one of two states that legally require a wildfire-risk disclosure at sale. California's FAIR Plan, the state's insurer of last resort, ended 2025 with 668,609 residential policies after adding 21,859 in Q4 alone — the kind of market shift a 80th-percentile score like Pacifica's can end up mattering for. More on the disclosure law.
What would actually reduce this score
Pacifica's 53.4% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
Where Pacifica's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Pacifica's 6,454-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Pacifica's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.